Media and Communications, Peace and Conflict, Politics and Governance

R2P: The Chinthanaya Version

In recent weeks, the public at large has been treated to the unseemly saga of the sacking, reinstatement, cancellation of visa and departure from the island of the Executive Director, International Centre for Ethnic Studies, Colombo, Dr. Rama Mani.

What began as a internal problem of succession and transition within that organisation took on quite sensational and sordid proportions in the ways in which it was handled and in the way in which an internal problem within a premier and long standing civil society institution in this country of international repute, culminated in an alleged threat to national security associated with the concept of the Responsibility to Protect or R2P.

The internal problems of the ICES are not of concern here, except for the way in which they were dealt with, demonstrating the manifest incivility lurking in the bosom of what prides itself as the community of the sensitive. Be it greed or maladministration, it seems as if the prize of institutional capture has obscured the imperative of institutional salvation.

Those who agree with this observation – peer and partner alike – must surely communicate their distaste in no uncertain terms to all those embroiled; puppets and puppeteers, predators and prey.

The association and support for civil society strengthening, governance, peace and democracy, must not countenance the negation of all these values in a grubby power struggle. There was a lot of this that was nasty and low and there should be no hesitation in calling it such.

Of greater interest and concern though is the use of R2P to turn Dr. Mani into a national security threat, involving the CID in her case and an assurance from the Prime Minister in parliament that she would not be granted an extension of her visa.

Under Dr. Mani’s stewardship, the ICES was to be associated with the R2P Centre to be established in New York as a southern organisation committed to human rights protection, democracy and governance.

Dr Mani presided at the Neelan Tiruchelvam lecture given by Gareth Evans, the architect of R2P, in which Evans pointed out that Sri Lanka could, if human rights protection and humanitarian standards were not met and the situation in respect of them continued to deteriorate, become a case where R2P arguments could be applied.

The point though was that the international community was obliged to assist governments to ensure that such a situation did not arise in the first place. The Responsibility to Prevent preceded the Responsibility to Protect and certainly any right of intervention on humanitarian or other grounds.

Dr. Mani’s interest in associating herself and her institution with R2P, has been enough to lead the defence and security establishment into the firm belief that she should be banished from our shores. Hard evidence though of this has not been made public and probably never will. I suspect that this is because it does not exist beyond the paranoia of the current dispensation.

Or is this yet another instance where the visa has been used as a weapon, to rid our pure paradise isle of alternative perspectives to the militaristic, majoritarian Chinthanaya?

It seems that in this war against the absolute enemy, the visa is a weapon as effective as the Kfir. It takes out the hostile, the humanitarian and the humanist. We are in the throes of an island-wide purge and those who cannot be purged in toto, like the Tamil citizens of this island, will most likely be given additional documentation from that which they have to now carry, for their own “protection,” a la the most recent policy prescription from that homegrown outfit totally committed to R2P – the JHU!

All those who breathed a sigh of relief with Dr. Mani’s departure and chalked it up as yet another advance in the certain and imminent victory against terrorism, are silent when the local version of R2P has nothing to do with protection and everything to do with punishment ! From papers and more papers to be carried at all times to eviction to mass arrests and detention, R2P is thriving in Sri Lanka irrespective of the purported machinations of Dr. Mani.

And in a Chinthanaya celebration of diversity no doubt, there is another version of R2P and it is the protection of perpetrators of human rights violations, more commonly known as the culture of impunity.

What would augment our sovereignty more – kicking out Dr. Mani or a single indictment against a member of the security forces allegedly responsible for one of the egregious violations of human rights before the Commission of Inquiry (COI) and the Independent International Group of Eminent Persons (IIGEP)?

Or effective action against paramilitaries turned electoral allies on the issue of child conscription? Or indictments against the high and mighty of yesterday, on the basis of the Justice Shiranee Thilaka-wardene Report? That in particular, would be the acid test for the argument that indictments undermine the morale of the security forces.

We are being turned into a silly and vicious little country by silly and vicious little men. They are mean and dangerous and have no compunction in playing dirty.

When the LTTE killed Dr. Neelan Tiruchelvam, I had the honour of speaking at his funeral. I remember saying that those of us who count ourselves amongst the community of the sensitive have many miles to go before we can sleep.

It is ironic that this message has to be repeated, nay reiterated and reinforced, on the likely demise of the organisation he founded and led to international recognition. It is time now, for this message to be heeded.